Page 62 of Immortal Rose

I was the only one left who did.

“Now,” I began, struggling to lift the massive tome into my arms. “How are we going to get this out of the house unnoticed?”

Chapter Fourteen

I should have instead worried about how long it would take for us to get home. Foxcourt had paid the hackney’s jarvey to wait for us, and as it pulled into the porte cochere, it blocked the police’s view of our satchels stuffed with documents and ledgers, as well as the cumbersome tome.

But rather than return to Foxcourt House the exact way we’d come, the coach was taking a rather torturous route through Linden’s darkening streets.

“This is the second time we’ve passed down Prince Street.” I sat back from the window, exasperated. “This is a scrap—the jarvey’s pulling one over on you.”

Foxcourt’s gaze never strayed from the other window, his expression dark. “I asked him to if he thought we were being followed.”

“Followed?” I echoed. “By whom?”

“The police,” Foxcourt said, rubbing his thumbnail over his top lip. “The jarvey is—he worked for my great-uncle for a time and can be trusted. He’ll take us back when it’s safe.”

It was another hour before we turned back toward the house, and the knot in my gut finally released. I was so amazed at my relief to see the mews and the gate to the house’s back garden, I let Foxcourt hand me down.

“Where’ve ye brought me?” came a small, peevish voice.

Right. Him.

We had a third passenger for our journey back to Foxcourt House, one who seemed distinctly unimpressed with his surroundings for a boy who spent most of his days negotiating suffocatingly narrow chimney flues.

“Off with you,” the jarvey said, gesturing toward Foxcourt. The boy had sat up front with him, and it had done little to air out his desperate scent.

“My liege,” Foxcourt said sardonically, offering his hands to help the boy down from the stand.

The urchin was little more than a rumpled ball of wool and soot as he stared at the earl. The whites of his eyes narrowed. “Are ye dicked in the nob?”

I bit my lip at Foxcourt’s expression, trying not to laugh. Another winsome child spat out by the Brickbats.

“I’m beginning to feel that way, yes,” Foxcourt said, clearly intuiting the meaning. “I cannot begin to imagine why I thought it was a good idea to bring you home for a bath and warm meal.”

In truth, I couldn’t, either, but I could—begrudgingly—think ever so slightly better of him for having tried, even if he was only doing this for self-aggrandizement. Frankly, Foxcourt would have an easier time trying to domesticate a feral cat.

So many of the children who managed to escape orphanages and workhouses spent years running wild through the rookery’s streets, until they were swept into Greystone’s Stone Sloggers or forced into unsavory and dangerous work. Many became accomplished thieves, like the notorious Tremont Terrors, whose legend still echoed through the Brickbats nearly ten years after they’d disbanded. Most children were simply left to their fates like all the rubbish tossed from windows. Forgotten or ignored by the men in power—there was little difference in the end, when so few survived to adulthood.

The boy gripped his seat. “Are ye one of them ‘mercy me’ spoil puddin’ types who’ll blather about God and pray over me while I eat stew?”

“No chance of that,” Foxcourt said.

Still, the little urchin resisted. “Are ye a snatcher then? I’ll warn ye, I’ll fight.”

Foxcourt looked mystified by this. I almost envied him for that ignorance.

“He’s not a snatcher,” I promised the boy. “Just a scrub and a hot plate. This is an earl’s house, you know.”

The boy avoided Foxcourt’s hands entirely as he leapt down from the perch. He gave the back of the house an assessing look, wiping at his dripping nose. “Seen nicer.”

I couldn’t resist. Even if the boy told others of this, very few would believe it. “This is, in fact, the earl in question you’ve just insulted.”

The child balked, peering up at Foxcourt. “Then why’re ye dressed like a piss prophet?”

“A physician,” I helpfully translated.

Foxcourt’s expression turned withering. “What a delightful turn of phrase.”